5SOS one shots (boys x Reader)

70. Is Silence Scary

Maybe it’s the silence that’s scary. Not the silence-silence, but how it feels. Because silences while with Y/N have never been uncomfortable – even when they’d just met and were stumbling bundles of nerves who tripped over their words as they tried to carry a conversation. (It’s a thing they laugh about now – how they were so nervous. Calum never admits it out loud, though, but he’s glad that she’d been as nervous as he was, because it meant that she gave a damn.)

The silence that envelopes them now is – unsettling. It’s thick, and awkward, and Calum’s pretty sure a cricket would be cricking soon enough.

He gulps, fingers running through his hair, tugging at it much harder than he’d intended to. Y/N’s not looking at him – just sitting and not fucking acknowledging him and it hurts so much more than it would have if she’d started lashing out on him because at least she wouldn’t be pretending like he didn’t bloody exist.

“Would you just –” Calum starts, voice catching in his throat as his hands make gestures as though it translates everything running through his mind. But she’s not looking at him, so it kind of backfires. “– just talk to me, alright? Please. I don’t – I don’t know what I did.” Calum’s voice comes out as a mere whisper.

The silence is deafening, but then she’s opening her mouth and asking, “You wanna know what you did?”

“Yes. Yes. Please just tell me so I can – fix it.”

She lets out a mirthless laugh, shaking her head as she finally – finally – looks at him. “That’s the thing, innit? I’ve to tell you. I have to tell you that you getting pissed drunk every goddamn night and fucking clinging ontomultiple girls is what’s bugging me. Incredible.”

“Clinging – what?” Calum echoes, brows furrowed as he shakes his head in disbelief. “I never – I wouldn’t. You said it yourself – I was drunk and –”

“Did you miss the part where I said you getting pissed drunk every night is one of the reasons why ‘m mad?” She drawls out sarcastically. “Or did you just overlook that because you think it’s okay or summat for you to just – fucking –” She cuts herself off, fingers running through her hair as she gets to her feet. “You know what? Never mind. Fuck it.”

Calum’s eyes widen and then he’s on his feet, too. He reaches out to grab her wrist. “Wait, babe –”

“No.” Y/N cuts him off sharply, shaking her head and practically ripping her wrist out of his grasp like his touch has just burned her. “No. You don’t get to tell me to wait when all I’ve been doing is waiting. Just because you’re the only one amongst the boys with a girlfriend, it doesn’t mean you’ll always have her – haveme – around. ‘m not standing for that shit anymore.”

“Wait,” he chokes out a single humourless laugh. “You’re – you’re breaking up with me?”

A smile flits unto her face but it doesn’t feel right. It’s too forced, too strained, too fake. ”Figured you’d be happy about it. You get to be drunk off your arse every night and hang off of however many girls you want and you won’t have to worry about your girlfriend getting mad about it, because you don’t have one anymore.” She near spits, then she’s turning on her heel.

“Y/N, please.” Calum’s voice is soft. Weak. “I just – ‘m sorry, okay? I didn’t – I would never –” He stutters out, never finishing his sentence. It’s not because he doesn’t know what to say – he knows exactly what to say, he just doesn’t want to because Jesus Christ, he’s terrified. He gulps instead, “Please, just. Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” She turns to look at him just before she opens the door, cocking her head to the side slightly. “Don’t what, Calum?”

“Don’t leave.”

Y/N scoffs, then she’s turning away again. She’s turning away and she’s going to walk out the door and if she walks out the door, Calum knows that she’ll probably never come back again. And if she never comes back again then he won’t know what to do because– “I love you.”

She freezes in her step at that, shoulders tensing. Calum’s nervous as shit now but if him lying to himself is going to make him lose the one person who he’s not related to that he’s ever felt love for, then fuck it.

“I do.” Calum says as he stalks towards her, walking around her so that he’s standing in front of her now. “I love you. I love your smile, your eyes, your laugh, your face, your fucking everything. I love you, and I am terrified. I’ve never – never felt like this before, okay? For fuck’s sake, ‘m still just a dumb kid. I went out and got drunk because it helped me forget, it helped me not think about it. Being drunk put this – this hazeover the thought, the possibility of me being in love with you – and that was what I needed.”

Y/N scoffs again, raising a brow at him. The corners of her lips tug up into a smile of disbelief, but Calum’s pretty sure that it’s not the kind of smile he’s hoping for. “What you needed? Is it that horrible t’ – to care about me? To even think about the possibility of loving me? You needed to forget that?” She lets out a single laugh. “Thanks, Cal. Really. Cheers.”

“No, that’s not–” he cuts himself off with a groan, gripping her shoulders lightly and resisting the urge to shakeher to get her to understand. “I just – you’re my first, okay? You’re my first proper girlfriend and things with you are so easy and I just – I got scared, okay? I am scared. Fuck, I’m terrified. But Jesus fucking Christ, I love you. I love you so much and I don’t know what to do because I find myself missing you every second of every damn day that we’re apart. And I –” he shakes his head. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for thinking that me acting like a knob would be okay with you, I’m sorry that I’ve been a shit boyfriend. I’m sorry and I love you, and – just. Please.”

He tugs her in towards his chest then, ducking his head so that he can hide in the crook of her neck. She’s tense in his arms, but she’s in his arms, and eventually she hugs him back – so he tells himself that it’s okay. That it will be okay.

(She hasn’t said a single word yet. Hasn’t said that she’s not going to leave, or that she loves him back, but she hasn’t let him go so god fucking dammit, he’s going to cling onto that little bit of hope that she might not leave, that she might love him back. Calum’s going to cling and not once let go because she means to much to him now for him to be able to just let her go. Not now, not any time in the near future.)